AdScam/The Horror!

Shiver me timbers – Is Pirate Bay scuppered?

Remember Pirate Bay? The Swedish buccaneers who streamed all kinds of great copy protected content you could download for free (Yeah, I fucking used it to get Brit TV shit that wouldn’t be available ‘till 2020 on Amazon… So, fucking arrest me!) Well, it’s just been sold, and the new owners plan to make it a legal service that allows content providers and copyright owners to get paid for content that is downloaded via the site. Ha, yeah, and fucking good luck on that matey. Global Gaming Factory X AB, a fellow Swedish outfit that runs Internet cafes and game centers, plans to buy Pirate Bay for 60 million kronor, (whatever the fuck that is) twice the fine that was slapped on The Pirate Bay defendants by a Stockholm court earlier this year. But here’s what I find really interesting… Pirate Bay is among the top 100 most visited Internet sites in the world! On the other hand, you have to feel sorry for Peter Sunde Kolmisoppi, one of the site founders, who’s been battling Twitter criticism all day and shows signs of fatigue with the entire Pirate Bay saga. "People hate me now for wanting to pause the six year free work we've been doing. Feels unfair. We have no energy left. We've been fighting for years. Where's the thanks?" Damn fucking right Peter. I’ll send you a big fucking check the minute someone makes an offer to buy AdScam.

Avast there me hearties... Douchenozzles and fucktards over the side!

Is “branding” bullshit?

Readers of The Ubiquitous Persuaders (and if you haven’t bought it yet… Why the fuck not?) will know that I take several pot shots at the branding mantra BDA’s love to fucking go on and on about – And if you don’t believe me, go to a few of their Web sites and enjoy their “360 degree branding” “brand wheels” brand fucktards” etc. Not that I have anything against branding, it’s just that for years, agencies have used it as an excuse to produce work that is non accountable. In other words, what they do does not necessarily make sales, it increases “brand perception” or some other asinine term for blowing shitloads of money for fuck all tangible results. Anyway, there’s a good article on chiefmarketer.com that discusses this subject in the context of today’s fucked up economy. Here’s a taster… “In today's world, advertising's goal is to change customer behavior, not to create interest or awareness . Even before the current economic decline, more and more marketers were asking for communications to create actions that would convert into tangible results like leads, sales and traffic.” Yeah, I know it sounds obvious, but not to the douchenozzles at the BDA’s.

It's about sales, stupid!

Jack & Suzy talk out of their arses for big bucks!

Have you seen that piece of shit Microsoft campaign called “It’s everybody’s business with Jack & Suzy Welch.” That’s right, ace douchenozzle Neutron Jack and the lady he dumped his wife of 400 years for. The geriatric wanker and his new bimbo show a case study, then they sit round a fucking big table and talk shit with the companies management. Only they call it “Jack & Suzy’s Work Out.” Suzy sits there most of the time with a heavy “thinking” expression on her face. Jack leaps in with gnarly gems you know he’s used a million fucking times like “You are fighting with a water pistol in a gun fight.” Fucking great Jack, no wonder you left GM with the world’s biggest golden parachute, including eight company jets and Viagra for life. So, here’s my question… Surely he isn’t doing this shit ‘cos he needs the money, he’s richer than Croesus and older than fucking Methuselah… But then again, when he kicks it in a few months, Suzy collects and goes off with the pool guy. Jack goes off to the big corporation in the sky and trades gnarly homilies like “All business is global” with other dead fucking CEO’s… It’s called MBA Hell.  

From The Onion. Check out perk #10.

Am I the only one who thinks most journalists talk shit?

Just a quickie here, but you may have noticed that in the past I have ranted about the pathetic state of journalism these days. Well today’s Associated Press piece on the sentencing of Bernie Madoff, takes the fucking prize. The headline reads… “Bernard Madoff gets maximum 150 years in prison”… And the sub-head reads… “Bernard Madoff sentenced to 150 years for vast fraud, likely to remain imprisoned for life.” Well, hello, if the fucker is 71 years old, and he gets 150 years in the slammer, I would assume he would definitely be in there for the rest of his miserable fucking life. Apart from the fact he’s going to a federal prison, and there’s no parole from those places, unless he lives to be 221, the only way he gets out is in a fucking box.

Hey Bernie... Welcome to the rest of your life!

Mad Men conquer the known universe, while lining pockets with lots & lots of dosh!

So, we’ve finally finished the annual Cannes love-in and everyone is nattering on and fucking on about how traditional advertising is dead and it’s now all digital, social, interactive, conversations, story telling, whatever. But relax. I am not going to talk about Cannes or what took the Zirconium, Molybdenum and Kryptonite Lions, ‘cos most people with half a brain don’t give a shit. Instead, I want to talk about how parochial a business we are in, in spite of the fact that most BDA’s strut their global capacities and the holding company heavies spend a great deal of time in First class airline seats and suites in five star hotels as they jet around the world after laying of a large chunk of serfs back at the ranch. So, here’s my question of the day… In all the years I’ve been over here, I am still amazed at the parochialism of the average American. It’s not that so few of them have ever traveled outside the country (less than half the sitting members of Congress have a passport,) it’s the lack of both knowledge and interest in things non-American. So, why do they bother with global networks? Oh yeah… Fucking money… Duh!!! Except they don’t seem to be making much. Maybe it’s all those Cannes entry fees.

Analytics that, you wankers!

And that’s not fucking all!

You have to laugh at all the fuss about the death of “The King of Pop.” I’m already sick and tired of it, but you can bet your arse, it’ll last ‘til Amazon and iTunes have lyposuctioned every last cent out of the people dumb enough to buy his old shit. Anyway, moving on, and I won’t say a word about Ed McMahon, or Farah… Why are the ad trades and every third rate fucking ad blog going nuts about the death of Billy May? Get a life people… The guy made really fucking bad infomercials. Yeah, he sold tons of shit to people stupid enough to buy it, but c’mon, watching TV when he came on was like stabbing yourself in the eye with a fucking knitting needle. I guess the only way you get respect in the ad biz is by kicking the bucket… Don’t worry, I’m not going yet. But when I do, I won’t give a shit what you say about me. I’ll be somewhere else getting well and truly fucked up!

I'm working like a fucking dog, here!

L. Ron Hubbard does TV!”

AdFreak has a funny piece on the new Scientology TV campaign, which although the pseudo religion itself is a piece of shit, isn’t a bad campaign… Meaning expensive production values (lots of stock, probably paid for by Tom Cruise) but nicely put together with a good music track. However having had a couple of friends actually falling for that shit and completely fucking up their lives, I wouldn’t recommend it to my worst enemy… Not even FDR. But buried down in the comments is this pisser of an incredible video… L.Ron Hubbard’s Space Station 33!” A fucking classic. Have a drink and watch it!

Xenu is on Twitter. Are you?

How did Dell do it? Certainly not with Enfatico!

Guys... Just a quickie on the social media argument… I've checked, and yeah there are lots of articles out there talking about Dell's $3 million in sales... Over two years... But, here's an interesting comment on one site... “Have a look into where the codes go - most of the sales come through fatwallet or slickdeals not twitter - someone picks it up from twitter and posts it on the deal sites. it could be looked at as indirectly from twitter but it would be interesting to watch what results they got if they just posted the codes directly on the deal sites. I highly doubt much of that $3m comes directly from users on twitter- again there's no real way to tell.” To be honest, I don’t know enough about this shit to argue fucking sensibly one way or the other, but I’m sure you guys will come up with the explanation… Standing by!

I'm the Fucking Twitter Man... I used to be the MySpace Guy... And I don't talk about SecondLife anymore!

More shit on the social media “bubble!”

My last post has certainly generated a heated discussion. So, let me clarify my position on “Social Media.” What I am saying is not that social media is a fad that will disappear. On the contrary, it will be around for a long time to come… It’s that very few people are going to make money on it the way they are going about things. And I’m talking about the site owners here, not the companies that may advertise on them. Just like the dot com implosion burned through a shitload of VC money and sank a lot of companies… It didn’t kill the fucking Web. The possible long term demise of MySpace, Facebook and Twitter won’t kill social media, but it will, once again leave a lot of the douchenozzles on Page Mill Road in Palo Alto, looking like a West Coast version of Bernie Madoff. The valuations of these companies are fucking ridiculous, and I’ll tell you why they will eventually crash and burn… Because they are appealing to too big an audience. Yeah, I know that’s a contradiction to their idea of getting shitloads of people signed up and then we’ll figure out a way to make money. No, the people who will make money through social media will be those who cater to a niche interest or specific market. Why do you think the biggest moneymaker on the internet is porn? Because there’s a fucking market for it. You’ve heard me say it many times, but I’ll say it again… Look at SuicideGirls.com as a perfect example of a company that truly knows the value of social media. They cater to a special interest group, girls who are into tattoos and piercing, and they have tens of thousands of members who pay a fucking subscription every month. If it belonged to the Wizened of Oz, or Zuckernozzle they’d have SuicideBoys and SuicideKids and Suicide fucking dogs and cats. Not just because they are greedy fucktards, but because they are too fucking stupid to realize that most people want to socialize with people like themselves. Not with every fucking wanker who wants to have the largest list in the universe of “Friends” who are probably total strangers. Finally, can someone point me in the direction of some reliable numbers and facts proving exactly where this, “Dell made $3 million in sales off Twitter,” bullshit came from. I’ve heard it bandied about, but I’ve never seen it substantiated… Not even on the Enfatico Web site.

My final words on social media!

The social media “bubble” By Paul Benjou!

My mate Paul Benjou, has a great piece over on Media Life about social media and how it could end up being a bigger blow out than the dot com implosion eight years ago. He shares my point of view that the very fucking tired mantra “Build the audience now, we’ll worry about making money later,” never made sense in the first place… Remember Pets.com and Webvan? And it still doesn’t make sense now. I like his take on Twitter… In just three years, Twitter had leapt to become the third-most-popular social network, and it too has no business model offering even a hint of return for investors. Twitter founder Jack Dorsey turns to a dictionary definition of the word twitter to define his site: "a short burst of inconsequential information.” Adman George Parker suggests another: "Staccato bursts of bullshit," and for investors at least that may be the more apt definition. Good shit (Well anytime someone quotes me, it has to be!) This is a great article. Get your arse over there and read it now.

That's what I call "social media!"